have to see the rates on the top 2% go up, and we're not going to get a deal without it. >> this week on "inside washington," let's make a deal. >> we are ready and eager to talk to the president and make sure that the american people are not disadvantaged by what is happening in washington. >>. or. >> an obsession to raise taxes is not going to solve the problem. >> a leading conservative decides to give up his senate seats. >> a lot of my role in the senate has been stopping bad things, but we need to do more than that and tell americans what we are for. >> in syria, a concern about the possible use of weapons of mass destruction if south. >> the regime might very well consider the use of chemical weapons. >> the chattering classes are already chatting about 2016. >> look, i am flattered, i am honored. that is not in the future for

may. "tim brant's college football captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- >> for the record, the unemployment rate has dropped to 7.7%, the economy adding 146,000 jobs in november. we want to keep that in mind as we head towards the fiscal cliff. only four in 10 americans expect the white house and congress to reach a deal on the cliff before the first of the year, and if this goes south, a 53% of the american people are prepared to blame republicans. the president's job approval rating is well over 50%. congress' approval rating is under 20%. why what a the president back down? >> the president isn't interested in a balanced agreement, not particularly

interested in avoiding a fiscal cliff, and clearly not been tested at all in cutting and spending. >> the senate minority leader says that what the president is interested in is getting as much taxpayer money has he can so that he can spend to his heart's content. with his approval ratings going up and congress' numbers at historic lows and the unemployment rate dropping, why with the president back down? charles? >> to some extent he is under estimating the damage she will suffer if -- he suffer if we go over the cliff. it will hurt the republicans in congress, which is why democrats will relish going over the cliff. but obama is not running again, unlike democrats in congress. he is thinking of his legacy. if we go over the cliff and into recession, and the cbo has predicted 9% unemployment, a drop in gdp, that will wreck his second term. i am not sure he has all the

cards. he has the advantage and republicans as their backs against the wall, but he may be overplaying his hand. he is pushing for unconditional surrender. i am not sure republicans will go along unless there is some give on obama's part. >> unconditional surrender, mark? >> i am not sure with the exact policy is. the president has the advantage and the factors you are seeing are on the republican side. the democrats' ranks are totally unified. but i think it is important when the president does prevail, which i think he will in this showdown, all but certain, that there be -- that it be done in a way that john boehner leaves with his dignity intact and a sense that he has achieved something. if it is just -- humiliation cannot be a

byproduct. >> colby? >> it would not be a defeat for obama in any way. we go over the cliff, a stop because republicans sent over the cliff. -- it is because republicans send us over the cliff, not doing what americans want us to do. the american people think we ought to increase the rates. there is a principle there. they give on that, then the president has to do something on entitlements and put something on the table that is tangible, and we will have to deal. but if it they don't rely on those rates, we will go over the cliff and will be their fault. >> nina? >> everybody can see the outlines of a deal.

the reason that president obama won't, i think, just be totally recalcitrant about this is that if we get this deal done, according to a number of top financial people i talk to this week, and the economy is likely to take off and save a lot of grief and make everybody feel a lot better, and congress will benefit from that as well as the president. that is why he needs to get it done. deal.'s are begging for a who is likely to move on this in the senate? olympia snowe? lugar? scott brown? >> i think you have identified the usual suspects. the problem republicans have is this -- you have people like scott brown in massachusetts, linda lackl, a twice-elected governor of hawaii, running for the senate, and other wilson in new mexico, who were good

statewide candidates with good credentials who lost for one reason, they had (r) next to their name. this is an albatross. this is a problem for republicans to deal with, and the president knows he has an advantage and the republicans have to get beyond this is a day are going to become competitive. >> any wiggle room in the house, charles? >> i don't understand when colby says for the president raising rates is a matter of principle. there was no principle involved. obama himself said at a briefing in july 2011 press conference that you can raise the $1.20 trillion that he wanted at the time without raising rates, by doing it by eliminating deductions and exclusions, which is the more rational way. obama's, and debt reduction commission had recommended that

you raise tens of revenue for the federal government, you do tax reform, and you actually lower rates while you expand the base, and the reason is that if you raise rates, you injure economic expansion, if you lower them, you exhilarated, and by making deductions, you make the tax system a more fair wind. you have the lawyers who work around the rates and and they have lobbies -- >> may i say -- >> no principle involved? >> i heard the july 2011 statement argument first ramesh lemmel. -- first from rush limbaugh. i think i heard it from drudge -- >> did you see it on tape? >> i know where it comes from and you repeated quite well. rates first?h

bill clinton did who changed it again, george w. bush. they thought it made sense. it tried to change the composition by making it about revenue -- you unwatched people don't understand the difference between rates and revenue. >> bring us all together, please. >> with the number of lobbyists and the super pacs morphing into lobbyists, god knows what will happen with the deductions. that will take some time when it happens. everybody understands that there's not some magic bullet. you have to raise revenue and you have to -- >> simply not true. >> estop true. it is a fiction yo believe at this point. >> the simpson-bowles commission said that every year you have

$1.10 trillion every year in tax expenditures -- >> and you get rid of the mortgage and -- >> no, you cap it, and there was a $11 to in every decade available. you cannot get $1 million out of that? >> senator jim demint heads for the exit sign. >> one of the mistakes the republican party made the last two years is trying to make obama the issue without sharing with america bold reform ideas that get people inspired to get behind us. >> that is south carolina republican jim demint, who has decided to leave the senate to head the heritage foundation, the conservative think tank. why is evening, mar -- why is he is leaving, mark? >> jim demint is a movement guy. not a legislator like fritz hollings who represents the state for generations.

he has been a movement by. you see the movement in primaries that republicans lost where they should of one the general election, whether it was delaware, or supporting marco rubio early against charlie crist. the other unwritten stories that you have two major conservative figures leaving this week. you had big armey leaving freedomworks, a very conservative outfit aligned with the tea party, and getting, get this, and $8 million buyout. jim demint has a net worth -- average of $41,000. he is going to institution that pays its chief executive more than $1 million. armey-demint -- if the congregationalist. they came to do good and they're doing very well. [laughter]

>> with him leaving the senate and going to the heritage foundation, the intellectual level of both places lifts up. now -- you got it. >> yeah, i got it. >> remember, heritage was the originator of the mandate for health insurance. >> he said that we spend too much time concentrating on obama and not our own positions, don't forget that it was demint who said in 2000 and that if we stop him on health care, this will be his waterloo, we will break him. he failed to do that. he has been a very partisan die for the whole time he has been in the senate -- partisan guy for the whole time he has. been in. >> demint was one of the guys against the treaty for disabilities, even with bob dole

in the senate. >> it was a un.n thing. >> nina is right -- the fabricated hopes helicopters coming in to home schooling parents and yanking their children away from them -- these guys live in terror of our primary challenge. 8 republicans dared to support the equivalent of eight treaty is supported by george bush and supported by mr. republican himself, bob dole, who limps from the wounds he sustained from world war ii. >> i don't think i have ever seen a larger ratio of enthusiasm and passion to substance in an issue in my life. these treaties are not worth the

paper they're written on. we have a u.n. treaty on chemical weapons, we have a u.n. treaty on nukes, we have a u.n. treaty on everything. this makes no difference. >> why cannot throw a bone to bob dole? >> why to throw a bone to the u.n. -- >> oh. >> is run by dictators, it has a human rights committee on which the worst violators in the world -- why should we subsidize it and give it any of the legitimacy at all? give me an answer on that. >> the chamber of commerce supports the street, along with veterans' organizations and religious groups. they support it because the united states has been the leader in this area and they but like other countries to comply -- >> it is model on the americans with disabilities act. >> i know, but it has no effect.

>> the point of the treaty is to get other countries to become signatories to adopt the language and the intent of the treaty, which is to look out for people with disabilities -- >> the way -- >> you accept the argument. >> oh, yeah, the way they human rights commission has spread human rights to countries around the world. >> we used to call people who think like this nativist. >> nothing to do with nativism. the u.n. is a pernicious institution and we ought not to give it legitimacy. >> let's look at where things stand in syria. >> if true, the reports mean that the united states and our allies face the prospect of imminent use of weapons of mass destruction in syria, and this may be the last morning we get. the time for talking about what to do may now be coming to a

close, and we may instead be left with an awful and a very difficult decision. >> senator mccain is talking about the possibility of military intervention should they employed chemical weapons. what form would military intervention take? >> i don't know whether it would be actual american boots on the ground, air cover. i know now. -- i don't know. this is one of those terrible international tragedies, and except for getting rid of assad, which would probably spark a for the civil war -- >> he is looking for a new address. >> you have a civil war that is just as bad between the factions that are there. this is like a bottle of something very fizzy that you shake up for years and suddenly the top has come off, and i don't know how to put this back in. >> are we behind the curve? >> the international community

through nato and the united states say explicitly that there will be consequences. it is not a difficult thing to imagine us responding to take out their capacity to do anything with those weapons. that is an international threat and they have post. with assad and all that, that comes second with those weapons cannot be used. >> we have a treaty that says you cannot use chemical weapons. >> oh. >> it was signed in the 1990's, and a big advocate? joe biden, who said it would have the moral suasion all over the world. treaties are useless. what matters is forced. >> are we -- we -- >> hold on a second. the united states president says something will happen. do you think he cares if it is written on a treaty and a turtle

bay? >> treaty? >> i am making a retroactive. . > -- retroactive point. >> making a red line is important. i am not sure with the red line is. i am not sure how you bomb chemical weapons. >> you cannot. >> what form will the united states intervention take? >> there is no use of what brown her -- of a drone here. >> what if the weapons fall into the hands -- >> the real issue is not that assad is going to use them, because he hangs if he does that. the world will not give him refuge in russia or elsewhere the problem is if he is losing control, if he is using air bases, if this stuff in there in the hands of jihadists, we

really have an issue. that is with the u.s. and turkey and others are worried at seizing it before it happens, because otherwise we will have al qaeda an-- >> i don't disagree. there will be international action taken, no question about it. >> on this one we cannot lead from behind. we will have to lead from a head. >> i want to talk about 2016. that's right, 2016. >> i am still convinced that the overwhelming majority of our people want what my parents had, a chance. >> that is senator marco rubio of florida, one of the leading contenders, among the chattering classes anyway, for the 2016 republican presidential nomination, along with paul ryan. among the democrats, a lot of talk about hillary clinton. is rubio trying to redefine the republican party, colby? ->> he is trying to put distance between himself and

what their standard bearer did with the 47% in being the plutocrat and showing he was completely in balti have any -- completely unable to have any impact on people different from himself because he cannot understand them. they are trying to show is another side to it it is early, and the answer will not be charisma or rhetoric. it is policies. anything in their favor that suggest there will pursue policies substantially different from what we've seen from the republican party as manifested by -- >> rubio gave a speech this week in which she talked about the people in our kitchens, the people who are on landscaping crews, and these are the promise -- their journey is our nation's destiny. that sounds like a democrat. >> this was an obamaesque and reaganesque speech, speech about

the best of us, and aspirational speech. the kitchen workers in the room stopped to listen, because he referred to them. it was a terrific speech. i suspect he will be a terrific candidate. >> what he extend health care to those workers in the room? >> it wasn't just an obama or reagan speech. it was a jack kemp speech. that was what jack kemp represented. jack kemp belief and practice that the republicans had to campaign in barrios and g hettos in every ethnic neighborhood. it is the difference between a five minutes till dawn conservative like jack kemp for reagan as opposed to the five minutes until midnight conservative like mitt romney. >> the big tent is what we're talking about, right, charles? >> i think he has that kemp appeal to all classes. he thought that republicans

ought not to be the party of big business. that was the image that romney gave. we have a new generation rising a news/that assad is holed up in the palace reading the treaty on chemical weapons. [laughter] >> believe it or not, charles, we get your point about treaties. hillary clinton about 2016. she says that it is flattering, i'm not interested. >> she does not really say that. anybody who saw the video that introduced her at the conference last weekend would have no doubt that she has least thinking seriously about running. it is like the video that you show at a convention. >> a week is a lifetime in politics, and 3 or four years is literally an eternity. but hillary clinton is remarkably advantageous position at this moment. one that would have been

unimaginable after the disastrous campaign, and let's be frank, internally it was a disastrous campaign in 2008, where she started out as the prohibitive front-runner and favorite. but now she is rehabilitated. there are second acts in america. she has had a second act and it has been terrific. >> i recall that prior to that election we were talking about hillary clinton and rudy giuliani as the candidates, prohibited the favorites. >> in that election i said neither one would be the nominee and that turned out to be the k street going back to the republican field, ryan and rubio, we will have to see where they are in the next few years. going back to that rubio speech, part tugging for the workers out there -- he still has to talk about how they get health care, how they educate their kids, he has to talk about

a lot of things that republicans traditionally don't like to talk about when it comes to certain groups of people. that is the test for marco rubio and paul ryan. >> what about chris christie and bobby jindal? >> christie is in temporary quarantine because of his behavior in the last week of the election. he is in talk. -- detox. >> detox on the jon stewart show. >> you have bobby jindal, kelly ayotte, ted cruz -- unless you are barack obama, you don't imagine yourself as president before you even serve in this and it. [laughter] he will have to wait. obama, of course, is the one exception. but this is a strong young outfield. mitch daniels and in jeb bush on the outside. what this tells you is what

could have been in 2012. you remember the line of it republican candidates earlier this year, it was not exactly a credit to the party. and 20 debate heard them. -- hurt them. >> the quarantined governor christie and the new jersey has a 72% favorable job rating among his constituents, the highest ever recorded by quinnipiac -- i mean, of any governor of any state. whenever republicans have done to shun him has worked very well in the garden state. [laughter] >> what about some of these other names? another democratic name? joe biden? too old? >> andrew cuomo. >> governor of maryland, martin

o'malley. all those people in nation themselves as potential -- >> will they really challenge celebrate? there is -- challenge hillary? >> there is a pattern of challenging miller, as demonstrated by the only man since dwight eisenhower to win 50% of the vote or more, barack obama. >> did you get a commission of for that? >> i want to share it with you, charles. >> see you next week. >> "inside washington" is brought to you in part by the american federation of government employees, proud to make america work. for more information about afge and membership, visit afge.org.

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from washington, the mclaughlin group, the american original. for over three decades, the